New Appointment in the Vatican Apostolic Archive

Vatican City, July 5 – Pope Francis has appointed Father Rocco Ronzani, an Augustinian priest and esteemed patristics professor from Rome, as the new prefect of the Vatican Apostolic Archive. This archive, which was formerly known as the Vatican Secret Archive, preserves Church documents dating back to the eighth century.

About Father Rocco Ronzani

Born on February 21, 1978, in Rome, Father Ronzani joined the Order of St. Augustine in 1997 and was ordained as a priest in 2004. He holds a doctorate in theology and patristic sciences from the Pontifical Patristic Institute Augustinianum in Rome, where he currently teaches. Besides his academic role, he is a consultant to the Vatican Dicastery for the Causes of Saints and the director of the historical archives for the Augustinians’ Italian province.

The Vatican Apostolic Archive

The Vatican Apostolic Archive houses 53 miles of underground shelving, preserving documentation from historic papacies, ecumenical councils, conclaves, and Vatican nunciatures around the world. Opened to scholars by Pope Leo XIII in 1881, the archive remains accessible to qualified researchers who can request permission to view specific documents.

Historical Significance

Since 2020, historians researching World War II have frequented the archive following Pope Francis’s decision to open the archives of the pontificate of Pius XII. Among the significant documents housed here is the original 1530 letter to Pope Clement VII from King Henry VIII, requesting an annulment to marry Anne Boleyn.

Name Change and Historical Contributions

In 2019, Pope Francis renamed the archive from the Vatican Secret Archive to the Vatican Apostolic Archive to eliminate the negative connotations associated with the word “secret.” The previous prefect, Archbishop Sergio Pagano, who served for 45 years and became prefect in 1997, documented some of the archive’s most noteworthy historical records in his book “Secretum.” These records include accounts from the Galileo trial and the raid by Napoléon Bonaparte’s troops in 1810.

New Role for Archbishop Pagano

Archbishop Pagano will now serve as the assessor for the Pontifical Committee for Historical Sciences, passing the torch to Father Ronzani to continue the preservation and study of the Vatican’s vast historical archives.